


Facets

by Barb Cummings (Rahirah)



Series: The Barbverse [82]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Character Study, F/M, Gen, gratuitous Pablo Neruda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-23
Updated: 2010-12-23
Packaged: 2017-10-14 00:29:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/143332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rahirah/pseuds/Barb%20Cummings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spike's a complicated guy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Facets

**Author's Note:**

> This story takes place in the same universe as "Raising In the Sun," "Necessary Evils," and "A Parliament of Monsters." It contains spoilers for previous works in the series.

Spike lies asleep on the couch, head tipped back against the tumbled cushions, one arm flung over his eyes. He's adapted to daylight hours as much as any vampire could, but he's always ready for an afternoon nap. Alex sprawls across his father's stomach, thumb firmly ensconced in his mouth. His tousled head is pillowed on Spike's chest, his small body secure in the protective embrace of Spike's arm. There's a small damp patch of drool beneath his plump rosy cheek, black against the faded cotton of his father's much-washed t-shirt. A bridge of sunlight spans the air above their heads, fragile and deadly.

Alex stirs, and Spike's arm tightens briefly around his shoulders. Beneath the dust-spangled arch of sun, father and son stretch and yawn and settle again, and the room thrums with the somnolent rumble of vampiric content.

This is the real Spike.

****

Spike stands braced beside Buffy at the foot of the stairs, axe-blade raised high. Two demons lie dead at their feet, and two more block the stairs above, fresh to battle while they're flagging. On the landing overhead, the cut-rate Grindelwald who summoned them is spitting out the jaw-mangling words of another spell.

THOK! Spike's axe embeds itself in the newel-post, and he drops to one knee, fingers laced to make a stirrup. Buffy sets boot, one, stylish yet affordable, in the cradle of those big competent hands, and a second later she's flying over horned heads and gnashing teeth, with a clear path ahead to Mr. Wizard. She lands, whirls, shoots a look back, only for an instant. He's gripping the axe-haft again, wrenching the blade free of the scarred wood, face a war-mask of blood and dust. He meets her gaze and grins, tongue wagging, fangs glinting, golden eyes ablaze with battle-lust.

This is the real Spike.

****

Spike lurks in the shadows on the afternoon Joyce Summers sets the bare-root roses out. It's not only her daughter's company he misses, and he racks his brains for the words to make it right again: _Look, I know I cocked it up with Buffy. But I swear, another vamp would think that business with the chains and the cattle prod dead romantic._ He watches Joyce wrestle the last of the roses from its pot and into the ground, patting dark earth down around spindly roots. She sits back on her knees, surveying the wobbly line of greeny-brown sticks in satisfaction. Wiping sweat from her brow, she peels her gloves off, and brushes a finger along one delicate, unfurling leaf. She smiles.

A week later, she is dead.

Years later Spike stands hipshot in the slate-blue twilight, cigarette dangling from his lip, studying the ragged border of the rosebed as if it's an opponent. Without warning, he whips the spading fork around, and strikes. The tines tear into the hard California earth, powered by vampire muscle. Methodically he works his way down the row - John F. Kennedy, Mr. Lincoln, Carnivale, Peace. Mulch and good old-fashioned steer manure, none of this poncy chemical stuff. He knows fuck-all about gardening, but Buffy knows less, and someone's got to do it.

This is the real Spike.

****

Spike topples out of the DeSoto as the door swings open and pours him flat on his ass in the driveway. Buffy shuts off the ignition with a sigh - the problem with taking Spike's keys after one of these celebrations is, then she has to drive. He's already hauling himself hand over hand to his feet when she gets around to his side of the car, clinging to the handle of the passenger door as it sways woozily back and forth. Or maybe it's him swaying woozily back and forth. Same difference. He blinks at her owlishly, big blue bloodshot eyes struggling for focus - well, no guessing how many fingers he's seeing just now.

She grabs the nearest extremity and pulls, and Spike falls off the door and onto her shoulder with surprising grace, nuzzling her neck with boozy affection. "'S all right, Slayer," he slurs. "After all, 'm drinking for two." He reaches down to pat her still-flat belly, enunciating with the care of the very drunk. "Keepin' your mum safe from the ravages of Demon Rum, I am." He straightens, suddenly, cups his hands to his mouth and bellows, "IT'S A GIRL!"

He collapses in giggles as lights flick on up and down the block, and Buffy rolls her eyes. To mask, maybe, the teeny hint of a smile. "Come on, Carrie Nation. Let's get you to bed."

This is the real Spike.

****

Spike leans across the bar and smiles, and though his teeth remain blunt and his features remain human, there's a lazy enjoyment in his eyes that terrifies. "Willy, Willy, Willy," he says, genial, and lays one callused hand across the bartender's thin, nervous one. "Wouldn't think you had enough intact knuckles left to risk a story like that." His fingers close, tighten. Bone grinds beneath them, and Willy the Snitch makes a high thin sound of pain. Spike's smile grows wider. "Music to my ears, mate," he purrs, and means it. "But I'm willing to listen to another tune."

"All right, all right!" the bartender gasps. "I saw 'em last night, and maybe I overheard a thing or two!"

"Spill, then." Spike's grip loosens, disappointment battling triumph in his voice. He's got what he needed, but... balls, he was just beginning to enjoy himself.

This is the real Spike.

****

Spike lounges on their bed, book propped against one knee. Candle-flame dances in the lenses of his glasses, gilding the smooth pale curves of muscle in tawny light.

 _I have named you queen.  
There are taller ones than you, taller.  
There are purer ones than you, purer.  
There are lovelier than you, lovelier._

 _But you are the queen._

Her body's tides rise and fall and rise again to the surging cadence of his voice: brown velvet and burning coals, broken glass and dark honey. The book falls aside. Her thighs spread to welcome his parting lips; Spike's head bows in worship, and the poet's last words are lost, an ecstatic reverberation in her flesh. He enters into her kingdom, making bold with her most secret places, now yielding up their mysteries to his touch. And the Slayer cries out _Oh William!_ , surrendering to this obeisance as she never will to any conquest.

This is the real Spike.

****

Later, Buffy holds him. He is a sleeping idol, sinewed with steel and sheathed in ivory, set upon burgundy silk. He is a small lean man with cold, bony toes and mouse-brown curls and just a trace of soft, self-indulgent tummy padding the hard muscle beneath. He is a demon who drinks the blood of the living and really likes fried onion blossoms.

He just is.

This is the real Spike.

 

 **The End**


End file.
